Contactless payments doubled during Olympic Games

By UK CreditCards.com

Contactless payments have been slow to gain
traction in the UK. Yet, with a captive Olympic audience in London this summer,
Visa hoped to publicise contactless technology, which lets customers pay by
tapping their cards -- and even phones -- on special terminals.

The numbers are now in. Statistics
presented by Visa Europe at the NFC World Congress in Nice last week show that
contactless transactions doubled in the UK during the 10 weeks leading up to
and including the Olympic Games. Will this enthusiasm about the technology
continue even after Olympic spirit wanes?

How Visa pushed contactlessThis time last year, many people in the UK had not heard of contactless
payments or had been ignoring their cards' contactless capabilities. With the London
Olympics, Visa's sponsorship of the games gave it an exclusive lock-down on
all payment terminals at official venues -- and an opportunity to push contactless.

In addition to installing about 3,000 contactless payment terminals at
Olympic venues (and promoting them weeks before the games), Visa also drummed
up publicity for contactless by giving sponsored athletes and journalists
limited-edition Olympic-branded Samsung Galaxy S III phones. The phones came
loaded with Visa's mobile payment app that allowed users to tap and pay with
their phones instead of with a bank card.

Encouraging numbersThe newly released numbers from Visa Europe suggest Visa's efforts may have
paid off. Among the findings:

During the games and the weeks leading up to
them, the number of contactless transactions in the UK doubled.

Compared with the same time period in 2011, the
number of contactless payments during the games increased six-fold.

Contactless transactions at Olympic venues
represented 15% of contactless payments in the UK.

About one in 10 of all Visa payment transactions
at the games (and one in five of those under £20) were contactless. At some of
the Games venues, such as Horse Guards Parade, as many as one in four Visa
transactions below £20 were contactless.

Those who were given the Samsung Galaxy S III
phones used their devices to make 15 transactions each, on average.

Will
enthusiasm for contactless continue?Mary Carol Harris, head of mobile at Visa Europe, described the response
from consumers as "extremely positive" in a statement and revealed
that Visa's priority now is to increase adoption across Europe. However, the
company recognises that change will not come overnight, with Harris describing
the journey as "a marathon, not a sprint."

One in five UK Visa cards now include contactless technology
-- and many major retail chains throughout the UK already have the special
payment terminals that allow consumers with contactless
credit and debit cards (or a contactless technology-equipped phone) to
"tap and pay" without entering a PIN for transactions under £20. Visa
predicts that half of all transactions over its networks will be through mobile
devices by 2020.

"We will continue to work with all of our partners in the new world of
payments to educate and encourage consumers on the ease, security and value of
contactless payments, whether they're made through a card or a phone,"
Harris said.